The Fifth Civilization: A Novel

by Peter Bingham-Pankratz

  All Roan could do was grasp the forearms of the beast holding him in place. He grasped even tighter when he felt the Kotaran’s tail come up from between his own legs and run up his back.

  “Don’t move! Don’t move!” was the chorus Roan heard from behind, and he could only guess that Jasper had come into the cell with his gun drawn. Roan prayed he would use it.

  “Fox’Lo curse you, avalanche of mud will bury you. Only Kotarans will know of life.”

  “W…what?” Roan gasped. He was beginning to feel light-headed as his ears strained under the vice of claws.

  “You mission fails.” The Kotaran laughed, a guttural and terrible thing. “Bauxa is no safe. Bauxa is your death.”

  Jasper had indeed slowly inched his way into the chamber, pistol drawn but trembling in his hand. The mechanic worked his way to the right of the alien, just inside Roan’s peripheral vision. The way Jasper was angled, he looked as though any bolt he fired might just hit Roan as well.

  “Let him go!” Jasper shouted. The alien rolled his eyes into his head and muttered something. “Let him go now or I’ll kill you!” After this repeated warning, the alien brought his eyes back to Roan and muttered something short and sharp. Then he released his claws from Roan’s ears, scraping the lobes and putting his hands in the air as if surrendering. His tail also recoiled back to its original position. Roan rubbed his ears as he took careful steps back, trying to get as far away from the creature as possible.

  Jasper still aimed the gun, but was moving away from the Kotaran now, too. No one had any idea how far his range extended. “Sit back against the wall!” Jasper commanded, and the being did so. His sudden compliance was puzzling.

  “Why did you do that?” Roan spat at the alien. “Why the fuck did you do that?”

  The Kotaran snorted. “You blasphemer. That why.”

  “Yeah, I get it!” Roan said, spitting some blood that had worked his way down from his nose. “Did you want to scare me? Did you?” Cause it worked.

  Kel took Roan by the arm, her tugs implying that beginning another confrontation was probably not the right course of action. Roan let her hand sit on his arm but did not respond to her calls of “let’s go.” Instead, he locked eyes with the Kotaran. “It’s too early in the morning not to have any closure,” Roan told her.

  “There are three gods,” the Kotaran spat. “They drive universe. They create all life and watch it grow. They make life on planet.”

  “What?” Roan couldn’t quite make out what this guy was talking about. Maybe it was the bad English, or maybe it was the ringing in his ears.

  “You mean, like Eden?” Kel asked. By now she had stopped holding on to Roan’s shoulder. “Is there a planet where your gods created all life?”

  “My gods no. All gods yes!” The Kotaran flung his hands in the air as if he were praising someone. “You all controlled by gods too. But you will be punished for not seeing their truths. You cannot violate sacred planet.” The Kotaran put his hands down, as if the spiritual revelation was over. He gave a once-over to the group, and settled his eyes on Jasper, who was still pointing a pistol at him. Jasper seemed to tremble at this. “You will die. Grinek kill you.”

  “Is he some sort of god?” Roan asked.

  A tongue shot out of the Kotaran’s mouth then quickly drew itself back in. A hiss followed. Roan knew this to be the sign of a negative in the Kotaran culture, not unlike a shaking head.

  “Grinek not god. Blasphemy! But Grinek has been chosen by gods. Grinek is close to god.” And the Kotaran put his hands on his knees and lowered his head. In a few seconds, the only movement from the prisoner was the occasional thumping of his tail. The conversation was over.

  “Who the hell is Grinek?” Roan asked. Neither Moira, Kel, nor Jasper could answer. Roan decided he didn’t care, and all that mattered was the coming arrival on Bauxa. The sooner that thing was out of here, the better. He rubbed his ears and when he retracted his hands they were red with blood. Everything sounded muffled, and he wondered if blood was seeping into his eardrums.

  “Doctor,” Roan said to Moira, “I think it’s time I had another check up.”

  Chapter 17

  Moira swabbed some disinfectant on the tips of Roan’s tender ears and then taped a small bandage to each. If only there were a mirror in the medical bay so Roan could see how ridiculous he looked, sitting in a grubby undershirt on a med table. On second thought, a mirror wouldn’t be a good idea. He already knew Masao, if not the rest of the ship, was going to make fun of him now.

  After a blood test to make sure no Kotaran diseases had entered his bloodstream courtesy the attacker’s nails, Moira declared Roan fit to leave. “I wouldn’t be visiting the prisoner again if I were you,” Moira chided, shaking and examining a vial of Roan’s blood. “Your heart rate is a bit high, you know.”

  Roan hopped down from the bed and gathered his captain’s jacket. She wasn’t saying anything he hadn’t heard for years. “If you liked my heart rate, you should check out my liver. Though the good captain did her best to improve it.”

  “I know. I helped convince her to lock that stuff up.”

  “The plot thickens. You got an protein bar here?”

  Moira gestured to a cabinet. Roan found a bar inside and tore off the wrapper before shoving it in his mouth. Giving Moira a tip of his ball cap, he left the medical bay to find Kel waiting in the main exam room. She appeared fascinated by an eye-scanning machine and Roan suspected she was trying desperately not to listen to what was being said.

  “How do you feel?” Kel asked.

  “Never better.”

  “Good. Those bandages are very stylish, by the way.”

  “Hardy har.”

  Kel smacked her hand on the counter, as if that brought some finality to their banter. “We’ll be at Bauxa in three hours. In fact, we’re already beginning to pick up their broadcasts.”

  “Oh good. What’s going on in the latest telenovels?” Roan didn’t care in the slightest, but he just wanted to throw the conversation back in her court. It was a little early to be talking about such mindless things.

  “Everyone needs to be on their game today, Nick. Even you. I know that’s a lot to expect, but these Bauxens are very impatient people. We show the slightest sign of complacency or that we’re holding something back, they’ll grow suspicious of us.” Moira walked in and raised her eyebrow at the two of them talking. She hesitated a bit at the two individuals conversing in her workspace, but Kel addressed her to dispel the awkwardness.

  “Everyone’s been inoculated, right?” Kel knew full well the answer.

  “Yes, captain. We finished that last week as per your orders. The Seplen flu won’t be bothering us this time, and neither will dengue, if we stay out of the southern hemisphere.”

  “Good.” That was Kel’s word of the morning, if not the day. She focused her attention again to Roan. “I have to get to the cockpit. Walk with me.”

  Roan happily obliged.

  The crew was just beginning to wake up and one could hear the thump of boots on the metal decks above, below, and around. By oh seven hundred everyone on the Colobus was scurrying around like rats.

  “Jasper will take care of the prisoner,” Kel told Roan as they navigated the ship’s corridors. “I don’t think we have to worry about him anymore.”

  “Jasper?”

  “No, Nick, the prisoner.” She sighed. “A few Bauxen police are going to be helping us with his transfer.”

  “Something to enjoy.” If there was anything more comical than a bunch of fat Bauxens taking on a nimble Kotaran, Roan didn’t know it. Part of Roan wanted to enjoy that sight in person, though he was sure he’d want to be elsewhere when the Kotaran easily dispatched his captors and came for the humans with murder in his bones.

  “And I want you, Nick, to pilot the ship in for us. I’ve got to prepare the Colobus for landing. You can handle that, can’t you? A month away from the controls hasn’t…degraded your skills?” />
  He laughed. “I’ve been away from the controls for a lot longer before. Nothing could take those skills away from me, not even a Kotaran trying to dig them out of my mind through my ears.” She laughed a little at that, too, which made Roan feel a bit better. Something told him they weren’t just talking about piloting. They were now climbing the steps to the cockpit. “Was that all you wanted to say to me, Kel? Or should I call you Captain?”

  She cleared her throat and held her head up high. Each step she took was deliberate and firm, and Roan was concerned at the sudden change in attitude.

  “I guess you deserve some answers. We haven’t really talked in weeks, and I’ve kind of locked myself in the cockpit.”

  “Yes.”

  “A lot has happened. Aaron, the Kotarans, your moods…”

  “Now, come on. You locking up the liquor, that’s what’s been causing my moods. But I had a nice talk with Masao this morning, and he thought of a novel way for me to avoid drinking. You have nothing to worry about there.” They reached the top of the stairs.

  “So I’ve decided…” Kel sighed. That was never a good sign. “Look, Nick, we’ve been under an unbelievable amount of stress. Being chased will do that to you.”

  Roan said nothing.

  “And that hasn’t made it easy to think clearly. Oh, I’ve thought about this planet, all right. There’s nothing keeping me on Earth. Nothing keeping me with the Company. This is the greatest adventure I’ll ever be on.” Kel ran her hands through her black hair. Shook her head. “But Nick, it’s you I’m thinking about. I don’t know how to read you. Don’t know where your passions are. I know there’s still an attraction there, between us.”

  “Yeah.”

  “But I need to know where you stand on things. Are you coming along with us to this Planet X?”

  Roan nodded. He didn’t know where this conversation was going, but the tone didn’t agree with him.

  “Like you said, I crave adventure, Kel. And I got no one back on Earth, either.”

  “Well, here’s the thing, Nick. I have to know if you have principles. If you’re coming along for something other than me. Because I don’t know if I can be with anyone a long time. Especially someone who’s…and I’m sorry to say this, someone who’s spent so much time in the company of death.”

  Roan cringed.

  “You see, Nick, when I close my eyes all I see are the bodies of those crewmen. The blood on the floor, on the walls. I can separate this Planet X from all that, but I can’t separate you from it. And you know what’s even worth? This mayhem doesn’t seem to bother you at all.”

  Getting hit by a brick is hard to accept. There was Kel Streb in front of him, freighter captain and fellow Euro from the refugee camps. Lover of anything that tasted of orange, practitioner of yoga even when it was forbidden, the only woman he ever dated who would agree to go to the gym with him and then outdo him there. Not a yard away from him, and yet it might well have been light years.

  “You know what, Kel? I see dead bodies, too. Every time I close my eyes I see Aaron’s burnt body on the ground back in Tokyo. So don’t think you’re alone in this. And don’t think you’re the only person who meant anything to me.”

  Kel started to say something. Roan didn’t hear it; he banged on the cockpit door. Joseph opened it and stared out quizzically.

  “Out of the chair, fly boy, your new captain’s here,” Roan said. Joseph rolled his eyes and did as he was told, crawling out through the hatch. Roan ducked in.

  Joseph put up a hand. “The yaw calibration might be a little—”

  “Yeah, yeah,” Roan said, putting his hand on the hatch. “I can do just fine on my own.” Right before he slammed the hatch shut, Roan caught a glimpse of Kel staring at the floor.

  ***

  A beeping noise awakened Roan. He snatched the ball cap off his face and focused on the controls before him. The autopilot had done fine enough for the past few hours, fine enough for him to catch some sleep, but now the alarm systems were lighting up. They’d reached the Bauxa system.

  All at once, the ship noticeably slowed: the bulkheads whined and the metal groaned after a month of FTL travel. Out the cockpit window, the stars changed from streaks to stationary, and Roan knew it was going to stay that way for a while. A bright orange dot grew larger out the starboard window and Roan recognized it as the solar system’s largest gas giant, Triseta. They passed by it at a hundred thousand miles per second.

  He’d last seen Bauxa three years ago, having to travel there to deliver a lithium shipment for a big battery company on the planet. It turned out the Bauxens were running out of lights to power their BV screens, and Christ forbid if they had to go a week without gladiator combat beamed in from Kotara. Also on that same cargo run was a crate containing a selection of Earth sculptures that had been acquired by a wealthy Bauxen for his own personal collection—all obtained through legal methods, Roan was sure.

  Still, when the neon planet appeared first as a speck in the distance, Roan grew excited. Finally, their haven.

  With each second, the planet grew larger still. If you’d never seen Bauxa before, the planet was quite a sight. Greens and yellows radiated from below a murky atmosphere. It wasn’t that the Bauxens had polluted it, just that they’d never gotten around to cleaning it. Algae made the oceans green, too, although Roan could hardly criticize that aspect, since the Caribbean Sea on Earth was now indistinguishable from grass if viewed from orbit. Two moons circled Bauxa, one of which had a reputation of being a tax haven and free trade zone. Roan had made more than one stop there. Anything goes in those parts of the Bauxen Economic Conglomerate.

  Bauxen ships flew by outside. Now those were spectacular. They resembled caterpillars, segmented into regions of ovals, yet they still retained the cylindrical shape of many Earth starships. You could always tell the ones operating at full strength from the light pulsating through the craft from fore to aft, adding something ethereal to the insect-like craft. Perhaps Roan could hop a joyride on one while he was here. Roan even recognized a few Earth ships speeding by at sublight, soon to go into FTL for a trip back to the Pale Blue Dot.

  A beep from a com. Roan answered the receiver.

  “Cockpit here.”

  “How’s it going up there?” Kel’s voice.

  “Situation normal. Anything you want me to know before we land?”

  “Just do what the Bauxens tell you, and try not to have us burn up in the atmosphere. Silverman was notorious for not inspecting his heat shield. The Colobus hasn’t had to enter an atmosphere since 2496.”

  “Oh.” Roan couldn’t blame the late captain for not inspecting the shield. The Dunnock hadn’t had a working heat shield in years. “So we’re not docking in orbit?”

  “Can’t risk it. You think you can handle that, Roan?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Good to hear.” Kel clicked off. Through the front windows, Roan watched the alien world grow ever closer. For a moment, he blanked on what he should do next. But a blinking red light and a buzz answered for him. Someone from the planet was trying to get a hold of the Colobus. With a tap of the red button Roan opened his own channel.

  “Colobus here.”

  There was a flurry of words and nonsensical noises from the other end. It took Roan a moment to realize that what he was hearing was Bauxen, a language he’d not come in contact with in years. Coupled with the static, it sounded like someone clearing their throat. The person on the other end let off a sustained growl right before he finished, and Roan had heard enough Bauxen to know that this indicated a question. Someone apparently wasn’t sure of the make and intent of their vessel.

  “Uh, Bauxa Control, this is the Colobus. Our Earth designation is C1-C4A, as your records may indicate. We only speak English on board this ship.” Hadn’t they got the memo that English was now the official language of interstellar commerce?

  “English?” replied the voice on the other end, in a heavy accent. There was some sh
uffling on the other end and the line went dead. Bauxa began to fill up the windows and Roan hoped they replied within a reasonable time frame. He really needed some instructions before landing on an unfamiliar planet.

  The hailing sign flickered once more and Roan again opened the channel.

  “Colobus here.”

  “Sorry about that mix-up, mate,” came the reply, from what was clear a Bauxen who had learned to speak English from a Brit. What was with them and aliens? “We got you confused with one of our trawlers there for a second. Yes, Colobus, registry C1-C4A, you are cleared for landing at the Port of Siy.” That was the planetary mecca for commerce. Good to get lost in. “Do you need assistance finding the port?”

  “Yeah, it’s been a while. Could you upload a map?”

  “Certainly, mate. Enjoy your stay on Bauxa. You have Landing Hangar…Eleventeen four.”

  “Eleventeen four? You mean one one four?”

  A pause at the other end. “One one four, correct. Sorry mate! Cheers.”

  “Cheers,” Roan sighed, and switched off the com. In seconds, a detailed map uploaded to the Colobus’ navigational computer, which automatically programmed the route into the ship’s memory banks. Now the Colobus would give itself instructions on coming to a landing in Hangar one one four. And while Roan really should have stayed here to monitor their descent, he had other plans.

  He was left with the distinct impression that Kel wanted him isolated in the cockpit when they landed. What conceivable reason was there for this? Did she think his mind fell down a black hole? Did she think he was going to stop any ground-hugging crewman from leaving so they’d have enough people to get to Aaron’s mystery planet? Roan settled on the “snapped” hypothesis. That would explain her wariness around him, her behavior toward the prisoner, her suspicious attitude.

  So Roan made some adjustments to the ship’s autopilot so it would handle more like the Dunnock. In a sense, it meant overriding some safety protocols, but the settings should make for a smoother landing. When that was all prepped, Roan let the ship do all the work and put his feet up on the controls. He fingered the PA and paged Kel.